Do you know Ward Sutton?
You should.
He's a brilliant and award-winning writer and cartoonist. His illustrations have graced publications from The New York Times to Rolling Stone. He also designed the opening titles for the TV show Strangers with Candy. (And he’s an esteemed subscriber to No Dikkering Around.)
He has a show in LA this weekend. If you're in the area, I encourage you to attend.
Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024: ART OPENING, 7 - 10 PM
Group Exhibition “American Punchline”
Subliminal Projects Gallery, 1331 W Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA
(Exhibition continues through early November)
I had the great privilege of working with Ward at The Onion. His show this weekend highlights his Onion work in particular.
Here's how we came to work together: I'd read his excellent Sutton Impact cartoon in the Village Voice for years. When I had the notion to run a parody of an editorial cartoon in The Onion, I knew he was the one to pull it off. We met and discussed the idea.
It was a tricky prospect. How do you parody an editorial cartoon while not being on either side of the political aisle? How to you straddle that tricky line between antihumor and parody, clearly communicating to readers that this is a spoof, and not just a terrible, unfunny editorial cartoon?
For starters, you make it an over-the-top hacky cartoon, one that uses cheap and obvious tricks to stir readers' righteous indignation. Like showing the Grim Reaper looking on scenes the artist disapproves of, or the Statue of Liberty doing the same, shedding a single tear—and doing this way too often. Like having the artist draw himself in the corner of the cartoon, making a snide comment.
Next, you make the cartoonist into a character, an insufferable ass who imagines his cartoons are great art.
And finally, you don't give him one political side or another. You just make him insane.
Stan Kelly is the character Ward came up with. His editorial cartoon has run weekly in The Onion for almost 20 years.
In the early 2010s I was delighted to join forces with Ward again on a series of videos featuring Kelly educating viewers on the finer points of editorial cartooning, breaking down the mastery of his own cartoons. I played Kelly.
Ward and I enjoyed a lot of laughs writing and recording these videos, usually with help from other Onion writers and editors.
The videos are below (as is today’s tip). Read on only if you enjoy the finest racist and misogynistic humor.
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